Scaffold Fall Kills Four Workers On Toronto Apartment Project

Ontario’s Ministry of Labour and Toronto police are continuing to investigate a Christmas Eve scaffold collapse at an apartment building under construction that killed four construction workers and injured a fifth. The workers were repairing a 13th-floor balcony when a swing stage on which they had been standing broke, sending them tumbling to the ground. The names of the dead were not released, but the Ministry of Labour has identified their employer as Metron Construction Corp., Toronto. Ministry spokesman William Lin would not comment when asked if the workers had been wearing safety harnesses. “Our investigation will take some time,” he says. While Lin could not release provincial fatality figures for 2009, he says there were 19 industry deaths in 2008, compared to 15 in 2007.

To write a comment about this story, please sign in. If this is your first time commenting on this site, you will be required to fill out a brief registration form. Your public username will be the beginning of the email address that you enter into the form (everything before the @ symbol). Other than that, none of the information that you enter will be publically displayed.

We welcome comments from all points of view. Off-topic or abusive comments, however, will be removed at the editors’ discretion.